


grace

by flyingfishpaste



Category: Bravely Default: Flying Fairy
Genre: Gen, Like huge spoilers, Spoilers, i just wanted to write dead bodies and kinda liked how it turned out
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-20
Updated: 2014-06-20
Packaged: 2018-02-05 09:57:01
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 884
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1814374
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flyingfishpaste/pseuds/flyingfishpaste
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>(he wanted to save them)</p>
            </blockquote>





	grace

She laughs, high, maniacal, the pinnacle of pulsating power and it’s so loud.

Ringabel can do nothing more but lay on the dusty grime beneath Airy, watching with dull, silent eyes as she cackles and giggles and screams, her wings beating the air like the very essence in it is her enemy. His head beats in time with the flutter of her wings, and he can’t move; his body has lost whatever had been pumping through it mere moments ago even though it shouts and screeches a maelstrom of emotions. His staff is to his side, and flexing his gloved fingers isn’t enough to reach it.

His mind swims, and all he can see are the limp bodies of the three people he knew, and the shimmering wings of Airy’s perfection. As if light in the pitch of the distortion, they flicker and shine and laugh, because they’re the Warriors of Light and light is meant to be their hope, they’re meant to be hope – but where is their hope now, as he and the rest of them lies bleeding and bruised and defeated?

A twitch in his hand goes unnoticed by the monster before him, wailing and cheering at her master. Ringabel’s eyes flicker to the body nearest to him and it’s turned against him; long and mattered chestnut hair spewed across the ground and the owner, substituting the view of her blood across the ground, though it’s just as gruesome. 

Her white as snow dress is torn and smudged, flaked scales of Airy’s butterfly wings and insect body across Agnes’ self where splattered crimson isn’t, and they flash in the darkness from the maw before them. She looks like an angel, and it drives the knife in Ringabel’s gut ever further. She doesn’t breathe.

(he wanted to save them)

Across him, Edea lies, her blond hair no longer recognisable as its cut nor colour. The only way he can identify her is how she remains still on the ground, her arms outstretched above her head in his direction. Her screams still rebound in the chasm, strained and pained as Airy’s flames reached her before his spell did. 

He’s glad, if nothing else, that he can’t see her face; for his last proper look of her to be a melted face that cannot be called Edea Lee instead of the determined look she had prior to their battle, tight lipped and eyes steeled and gorgeous; for that to be the case, Ringabel, the selfish child he is, can not bare to think of. He keeps that image of her in the forefront of his mind and tears his eyes away as quickly as he can from her corpse in his near-dead state, because he just can’t get her screams out of his head, groggy and tired. She doesn’t breathe either.

(he’s so sorry he didn’t see it faster)

And Tiz. Tiz brings the most hurt of all, a sharp, painful inhale as he sees him across the battlefield, illuminated by the red of the maw and the gold of Airy’s wings. At first glance, nothing appears to be the matter with him, and for a split second Ringabel allows himself to hope that he’ll get back up – but Airy moves again, and the skewer through his chest comes into a golden view, bloodied and sharp shrapnel from the remnants of her assault on the last two standing. 

Ringabel shifts, feeling the same in his stomach, a solid spear of venom driven into him with enough force to piece straight through and into the ground. The nausea has long since passed, instead remaining as a rock in his gut, and he doesn’t have the energy to so much as retch anymore. Tiz’s hands are still clenching his blood-red sword, despite his flowing blood and the pain that echoes in time with the dulled pangs that pierce through Ringabel’s body. He’s got the same affliction, and Ringabel can hardly hold his staff aloft.

Tiz’s face is the only one he can see clearly, and in the light Ringabel can make all his features out, from the distraught look on his face, auburn eyes wide in shock, to the shine of his gloves, tattered and ripped from Airy’s onslaught. If she moves just right, fluttering in the air, he can see his eyes still glimmer with false life. He’s the most still of them all.

(he’s so so sorry he knew what was happening why)

The air hums, and Airy’s shrill voice booms. In the fading world, her voice is the only colourful thing left, painting a picture solely from her voice; the vibrations and verbal ticks, her smooth, high voice smashing like a rock tearing through glass. When she goes silent, another voice starts up, deep, booming, the harmony Airy is unable to reach herself, and the world mixes as Ringabel’s breathing begins slowing. It’s the ugliest thing he’s ever heard, and yet the most beautiful at the same time.

She turns to them, hovering in the air, and all colour has faded but her wings, a blinding gold that hurts Ringabel from deep within. Inspecting them all in turn, her sharp, insane eyes land on his figure last.

He breathes. She smiles.

(and then all is black, and he’s thankful it’s over at last)

**Author's Note:**

> the move skewer looks really painful  
> i'm super glad i'm not these four  
> like it didn't quite hit me until they had to take that hit and ouch
> 
> also SORRY this is really old but i only just got the courage to put it up stares at hands   
> anywho thank you for reading!!


End file.
